Sunday, April 24, 2016

More worth-reading political news and opinion

Checked my blog stats

Had about 4,000 page views in the last week. With, again, 1,487 of them coming from France! Viva la Republic! There could be several reasons for this. Frenchmen, our Auld Alliance, may have woken up and want more info about the Jihadists. Or it could be ISIS supporters following me. (Only on-line so far.) ~Bob

Worth Reading: A letter to my church:

Dear Father Remi:

I've come close to walking out of mass before, when Deacon Mike was plugging for gun control. I didn't, then, but I resolved that I would walk out if the church again attempted to interfere, even if only by suggestion, with matters of internal politics of the United States or undermining of the Constitution of the United States or undermining of the security of the United States.

This morning, at the early mass, I did walk out after we were intoned to not be afraid of letting in "refugees." I'm not sure what universe the reader lives in. I am not sure what universe the writer of the request for prayers lives in. In the universe I live in, the real universe, those refugees are mostly - no, overwhelmingly - military age males, from a hostile religion, heavily infiltrated by ISIS/DAESH, a slave trading, raping, fanatical, genocidal, and expanding group of that religion. No, the State Department and DHS cannot filter out the maniacs.

Yes, as a matter of fact I do have quite a bit of experience over there.

I will not welcome them. I will not encourage others to welcome them. And I will not support a church that says we should. They are the enemy. They are the enemy of both civilization and Christianity. They are not an enemy to be turned by turning the other cheek. (Indeed, given the sexual proclivities of the region, it is wise to keep all one's cheeks far, far from them.) And those who would let them in are working hand in hand with the enemies of civilization and the Church.

Whether I shall come back to Saint Mary's, find another Catholic Church less politically and suicidally liberal, or join a less effectively anti-Christian Protestant church I cannot say at this time. I am pretty sure that whichever way I decide, God will understand my preferring not to support the ruin of my country, my civilization, or my religion.

Excerpt: Item one: Last week Donald Trump said he could pay off the entire national debt, roughly $19.2 trillion, in eight years — while slashing taxes. The Washington Post’s Wonkblog went to the trouble of running the numbers and discovered that Trump’s plan would require 24 percent economic growth, every year, for eight years. To put that in perspective, the previous record for growth was 19 percent in 1942, the first full year of America’s involvement in World War II. For Trump to deliver on his prediction, the economy would have to grow from $17 trillion to $90 trillion in only two presidential terms. Or, as the Post put it, “There is math, there is fantasy math, and then there is Donald Trump’s economic math.”

Here is Donald Trump praising Ted Cruz in his effort to stop Obamacare, as he introduces Cruz at a past Florida fund raising event. Trump says Cruz is a "very special guy" and "is a very very popular and important figure in all our lives and the life of America". Trump said he likes Cruz "so much", and that he would have "liked to have used Cruz as one of his lawyers". Nothing about "Lyin' Ted" or "Cheatin' Ted" here. Boy, how things have changed.

Excerpt: I’m soooo freaking sick of the lies from the Trump campaign out there. They have called Ted Cruz a liar and accused him of bribing and stealing delegates, when nothing could be further from the truth. Everything Cruz has done has been honest and aboveboard. Unlike Donald Trump who is having his campaign strong-arm delegates in Delaware. Delegates are being threatened with lawsuits and hateful Twitter campaigns if they don’t fall in line with Trump there. It’s despicable. If you can’t bribe them with Trump’s billions, he’ll sue them out of existence. Instead of shining the light on that though, the media goes after an incident that was innocent where a little girl passed $5 and a note to Cruz during an appearance. Cruz then handed both to a Cruz staffer who collects things given to Cruz. It was a touching moment, not bribery. And it’s just viciously scummy to paint it otherwise.

Excerpt: A more fundamental problem with Martin’s narrative is that it fails to clearly explain that the overwhelming majority of Republican delegates are bound based on primary or caucus results on the first ballot. In fact, because some states use winner-take-all or winner-take-most rules, the Republican delegate math tends to advantage the front-runner — in this case Trump, who has 47 percent of the delegates awarded so far with only 38 percent of the vote. By contrast, under the Democrats’ highly proportional delegate allocation rules, a contested convention would already be all but guaranteed.

Hey, 'Conservative' Trump Supporters: Your Godking Played You For Suckers

Excerpt: This, of course, is no shock to those of us who believe that Trump’s short respite in the conservative camp was merely a cynical ploy to gain political support, and think that down deep, Trump is who he always was: a big government leftist with a tendency toward social libertinism and a streak of “I’ll say whatever the hell I please because I’m rich and nobody’s ever said no to me.” After all, Trump said as early as 1999 that he would consider same-sex marriage thanks to his experiences in New York (yes, Trump coined the “New York values” argument); he said at that time that he was “very pro-choice in every respect”; he testified before Congress in 1991 against Ronald Reagan’s tax cutting. He gave more money to Democrats than Republicans between 1980 and 2010. He supported nationalized health care, high tariffs (he still supports this), and Planned Parenthood (he still supports this, too).

Excerpt: There are all too many non-Muslims who voice support for terror as well. One notorious example: Ward Churchill, a white American university professor of European, Christian descent called the 9-11 victims "little Eichmanns." Other non-Muslims say that poverty or injustice justifies terrorism. Good people of all beliefs need to say, without ambiguity or apology, that Western Civilization is worth maintaining, and that terrorism is both immoral and a tactical dead-end. If Muslims don't like an aspect of public life, they can change it through organizing and hard work. But we aren't having that conversation to the extent that we should. Instead too many of our cultural elites are apologetic about Western Civilization, and too eager to make excuses for terrorism.

Excerpt: In a press conference on Friday morning, which followed a statement released earlier this week, Season 4 winner Randal Pinkett led a group of fellow contestants—Kevin Allen, Tara Dowdell, Marshawn Evans Daniels, James Sun, and Kwame Jackson—in denouncing the catchphrase-spouting reality star that gave them television exposure. “We acknowledge Donald’s success as a businessman, and genuinely appreciate the opportunity The Apprentice afforded all of us,” said Pinkett, the first black winner of The Apprentice and now a business consultant. “We, however, strongly condemn Donald’s campaign of sexism, xenophobia, racism, violence and hate.”

Excerpt: For over a month now, Trump has continually dodged the chance to participate in a televised debate with Ted Cruz. He claims to do so out of some misguided notion that he is “sparing” Republican voters from having to watch another debate. But the reality, of course, is that Trump is terrified of having to engage in one-on-one debates with those who have ideas and solutions where he has none. Telling voters that you will hire the best people to inform you on the issues is not an attractive selling point when the man across the stage from you is already quite informed on the issues himself. Furthermore, Cruz even beats Donald at finding the best people! The “best and brightest” that Trump has hired to run his campaign have spent the past month getting their proverbial clocks cleaned by Cruz’s people in procuring loyal delegates for the convention. When they aren’t busy wringing their hands over imaginary election rigging or threatening violent upheaval of the nomination process, Trump’s people have proven themselves to be woefully incompetent at running a presidential campaign. Meanwhile, the political gravitas of Cruz’s team may very well end up delivering him the nomination in July.

Only half of the $6 million Trump raised for vets has been delivered to charities

Excerpt: I will never vote for Donald Trump because I stand with certain principles. I stand with small government and free markets and religious freedom and personal responsibility. Donald Trump stands against all of these things. He stands for Planned Parenthood and trade restrictions and targeting of political enemies and an anti-morality foreign policy and government domination of religion and nastiness toward women and tacit appeals to racism and unbounded personal power. I stand with the Constitution of the United States, and its embedded protection of my God-given rights through governmental checks and balances. Donald Trump does not. I stand with conservatism. Donald Trump stands against it. I stand with #NeverTrump.

Excerpt: The company burned no fossil fuels but plenty of taxpayer dollars. Even $1.5 billion in subsidies and loan guarantees can’t save a “clean” energy company from bankruptcy. That’s the takeaway from the looming failure of SunEdison, a company that touts itself as the “largest global renewable energy development company.” Once a darling of Wall Street and the green Left because of SunEdison’s portfolio of wind and solar projects, the company’s stock is now in free fall. Furthermore, two related companies that were spun off from SunEdison — TerraForm Global and TerraForm Power — also appear to be in financial distress. On March 30, Brian Wuebbels, the CEO of both TerraForm companies, resigned effective immediately. If all that weren’t enough, the company is also under investigation by both the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission about its finances and the disclosures it made to investors.

Excerpt: NGUYEN HUU VINH is a Vietnamese blogger better known by the name Ahn Ba Sam. He’s no radical; he was once a police officer in the Ministry of Public Security in Hanoi, later a private investigator, and is the son of a former Vietnamese government minister who served as ambassador to the Soviet Union. After leaving the police, Mr. Vinh started several popular blogs that provided links to articles about social, political, economic and cultural issues in Vietnam, drawing from state media and from activists. The blogs were too much for Vietnam’s authoritarian rulers, who control the major news outlets and restrict speech, association and religion. In May 2014, Mr. Vinh was detained, along with his assistant, Nguyen Thi Minh Thuy. They were held in prison throughout last year, without trial, a period when Vietnam was in the final throes of negotiating with the United States over the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. (At least this is getting steadily more attention. Not that Mr. Obama will pay any attention to it. --Del)

Excerpt: Hillary Clinton got into a bit of trouble earlier this month when she told "Meet the Press" host Chuck Todd that "the unborn person doesn't have constitutional rights."

Clinton was merely noting that some restrictions on abortions are permitted under the law. But the real kerfuffle was over the idea that a person can exist in America without any rights -- or that fetuses are people at all. The International Planned Parenthood Federation cautions activists to avoid the "p" word. It's not a person until it's born or, as Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) once suggested, until you bring it home from the hospital. Until then, it's a fetus or "uterine contents." Planned Parenthood advises that activists don't say "abort a child," preferring "terminate a pregnancy" or some such.

Excerpt: Authoritarianism, always latent in progressivism, is becoming explicit. Progressivism’s determination to regulate thought by regulating speech is apparent in the campaign by 16 states’ attorneys general and those of the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands, none Republican, to criminalize skepticism about the supposedly “settled” conclusions of climate science. Four core tenets of progressivism are: First, history has a destination. Second, progressives uniquely discern it. (Barack Obama frequently declares things to be on or opposed to “the right side of history.”) Third, politics should be democratic but peripheral to governance, which is the responsibility of experts scientifically administering the regulatory state. Fourth, enlightened progressives should enforce limits on speech (witness IRS suppression of conservative advocacy groups) in order to prevent thinking unhelpful to history’s progressive unfolding. (I'm currently reading a science book, The Story of Earth. The author reports that another scientist, who had a different theory on the origin of life, tried to abort his research, saying it was a loser and "I don't know why we are even discussing this." That is, the author was challenging the "settled science" with a new theory, which is now accepted. ~Bob)

Excerpt: In a seven-minute video posted on Campus Reform, a campus police officer asks Parent where the weapon is that is meant to go in the holster. “I don’t have it,” he tells the officer, according to Al.com. “Would you like a copy of the Constitution?"

No additional comments necessary. General Flynn is right on target. This article and his book should be debated by our military leadership, certainly this Administration/Congress, and the elite media. GBH (MajGen, USMC (Ret)

Excerpt: President Obama stuck his nose in the Brexit question in Great Britain, provoking outrage and scorn when he threatened the Brits by warning that if they left the EU, the UK would be “at the back of the queue” on any trade deal. Obama claimed that his threat wasn't a threat but rather he was trying to "enhance the debate." At a press conference with Prime Minister Cameron, a BBC reporter asked the president if it was any of his business whether the UKremained in the EU.

Excerpt: Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, told PJM that China is “celebrating” U.S. efforts to reduce its carbon emissions because “they will end up inheriting” much of America’s manufacturing base. Inhofe also called climate change a “Hollywood problem.” ...Right now, every 10 days China builds a new coal-fired power plant and they are going to continue to do that by their own admission until 2020, then they say they may start reducing it,” Inhofe told PJM during an interview on Capitol Hill.

Excerpt: President Obama defended his decision to evict a bust of Winston Churchill out of the Oval Office during his first term, telling Britons today that he loves the legendary prime minister but wanted to keep tables from "looking a little cluttered." After Obama took office, he returned a Churchill bust that the White House said had been lent to President Bush by Prime Minister Tony Blair. ... "And I suspect that most people here in the United Kingdom might agree that as the first African-American president, it might be appropriate to have a bust of Dr. Martin Luther King in my office, to remind me of all the hard work of a lot of people who would somehow allow me to have the privilege of holding this office... (Trying to put the fire out on the bridges he burned? Too little, too late. --Barb)

Obama tries telling Brits wanting out of the EU what to do. By Judi McLead

Excerpt: The most ridiculous sound in the world has gotta’ be the one of an overbearing Barack Obama rattling his saber at Brits who want out of the EU. It’s going to take more than insipid “back off” orders from the likes of Obama to frighten Brits from voting the way they want on Brexit. A feeble quack from a lame duck on his way out of public office will never dim the knowledge that it comes from a no-boots-on-the-ground in jihadist-held territory, no-skin-in-any-game-but-his-own, semi-golf pro, part-time president. Tough talk from politicians rarely leave any traction of note. True-grit Brits with a storied history have no fear from a man whose own history is one held under lock and key. (It's nice to see that others who haven't (so far) been termed Far Right Rednecks in a different country can also look at events and see the stupidity and arrogance on display. Too bad more Americans can't do the same. --Del. I think the Brits were likely to vote against an exit. This might convince them to vote for it. ~Bob)

Barbarians Inside the Gates . Navy Secretary Ray Mabus and the cultural evisceration of the U.S. Navy. By Dr. Craig Luther

Excerpt: President Obama came into office in 2009 promising "transformation" and he has delivered on that promise. Over the past 7 1/2 years we've witnessed trillion dollar deficits and the establishment of a highly politicized and inexorably failing health care system ("Obamacare"); the "weaponization" of government agencies (think, IRS, EPA, DOJ) to intimidate and attack his political opponents; the calculated and feckless decline of American power and influence throughout the world; relentless redistributionist policies; and the president's support (often with a wink and a nod) of thuggish (and sometimes violent) radical groups like "Occupy Wall Street" and "Black Lives Matter." As a result, America is "on edge" -- socially, racially, economically -- as it hasn't been for decades. Indeed, many have reached the sobering insight that America's best days may now be behind her. Overlooked by most in Obama's relentless efforts to "remake" America has been his ongoing and dangerous transformation of our military. Here I am not going address the dozens of weapon systems cut, or the tens of thousands of troops given their "pink slips." What I want to speak to is his administration's systematic destruction of the 200+ year-old culture of the U.S. military. This "multicultural makeover," happening right before our eyes, threatens to undermine the very fabric of our armed forces. (I have lost track of how many such excellent screeds about the horrific mess Obama and his minions have made of what was the finest military in the world. It really doesn't need to be repeated, but this one is so good I thought to pass it on anyhow. Spread it out to those who don't understand what's gone on. --Del)

Religion of Peace News

Shari'a Law: Christian Lashed for Violating Islamic Law in Indonesia. By Daniel Greenfield

Excerpt: This is Islam. This is Islamic law. Beneath all the lies and spin, it's this simple. And it's spreading. Just as it spread to Indonesia, it can spread to Europe and America. But I'm sure if the mainstream media gets around to covering this in any depth or range, the angle will be "Indonesia Muslims Fear Backlash".

Ex-hostages of the Islamic State identify Brussels jihad mass murderer as their captor. By Robert Spencer, JihadWatch.org

Excerpt: “Marie-Laure Ingouf, a lawyer for Nicolas Hénin and Pierre Torres, two of the four French journalists who were first detained in 2013 by the Islamic State in Syria, said that the former hostages had identified one of their captors as Mr. Laachraoui, who used the name Abu Idris at the time.” This means that Laachraoui was able to leave Belgium, go to the Islamic State, and return to Belgium with no problem. Any attempt to forbid him from returning on the grounds that he had, by journeying to the Islamic State, joined an entity that has declared war against Belgium and Europe in general would have been dismissed as “Islamophobic.”

Christian refugees “let down” by Pope: he promised to take them to Italy but then took only Muslims instead

Excerpt: CNN, in line with common mainstream media practice, doesn’t deign to inform us about what kind of terror plot this was. But the reader can get the information that this was a jihad plot from the setting in Iraq, the tangential mention of ISIS, etc. If World War II had been fought in this way, few Americans would have been aware that we were at war with Nazi Germany.

Mauritania: Appeals court upholds blogger’s death sentence for apostasy. By Robert Spencer, JihadWatch.org

Excerpt: “M’khaitir has apologised and said he never meant to insult the Muslim Prophet Muhammad….The original announcement of his death sentence was met with public celebrations.” Public celebrations? Islamic apologists in the West tell us that Islam has no death penalty for apostasy, and that Muhammad was tolerant of personal insults, but Muslims in Muslim countries constantly behave as if the opposite were true. And it is. “They wish you would disbelieve as they disbelieved so you would be alike. So do not take from among them allies until they emigrate for the cause of Allah. But if they turn away, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them and take not from among them any ally or helper.” (Qur’an 4:89) A hadith depicts Muhammad saying: “Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him” (Bukhari 9.84.57). The death penalty for apostasy is part of Islamic law according to all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence.

Minnesota Muslims spoke about planning jihad massacres in the U.S. for the Islamic State

Excerpt: President Barack Obama said during a press conference in Britain Friday that the U.S considers it a major national security issue that there is uncontrollable migration into Europe. “What happens in Europe is going to have an impact in the United States,” Obama said. “We consider it a major national security issue that you have uncontrolled migration into Europe. Not because these folks are coming into the United States, but because if it destabilizes Europe, our largest trading block, trading partner, it’s going to be bad for our economy.” (BAD FOR THE ECONOMY? The economy already is in the tank..... So, POTUS only thinks in terms of dollars and cents, not lives. Nice. Might make him look bad if economic growth got below 0.5%...Barb)

Excerpt: As a large part of a broader, virulently anti-Israel resolution, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) refused even to refer to the Temple Mount as such, instead adopting the Arabic title, the “Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram al-Sharif” – while refusing to even acknowledge the factually undeniable, age-old Jewish links to the famous Western Wall and its environs........ There is no doubt – historical, archaeological, cultural, or religious – that the TempleMount and especially the Western Wall is, in toto, the single holiest site for all Judaism, the very location most central to the entire religion. By comparison, the Al-Aqsa Mosque there is considered only the third holiest site for Islam, which can point to no historically verifiable connection to the site until well after Islam was founded. (Meanwhile, US ceding more and more of its rights and freedoms to UN global control....Barb)

Excerpt: One thing is certain: if the roles had been reversed, and a Jewish student had asked a Muslim politician why she was so “smelly,” that student would no longer be at Harvard, and would be subjected to international opprobrium, while stories on “Islamophobia” would be blanketing the airwaves and filling mainstream media publications.

The 'Obama Road."ISIS suspect reveals plans to open up route from Syria to U.S. through Mexico

Excerpt: Guled Ali Omar told the ISIS members about the route so that it could be used to send members to America to carry out terrorist attacks, prosecutors alleged in a document filed this week. ... The men — Omar, 21; Hamza Naj Ahmed, 21; Mohamed Abdihamid Farah, 22; and Abdirahman Yasin Daud, 22 — have pleaded not guilty to multiple charges, including conspiracy to commit murder outside the U.S. Prosecutors have said they were part of a group of friends in Minnesota's Somali community who held secret meetings and plotted to join the Islamic State group.

Excerpt: Students at Cambridge and Oxford announced on Thursday that they would be holding referendums on whether to split from the NUS following the election of Malia Bouattia, the report said. In 2014, while speaking at a “pro-resistance” event celebrating “Gaza and the Palestinian revolution,” Bouattia asserted that it is “problematic” to consider that “Palestine will be free” only by means of “non-violent protest.” In 2011, while attending the University of Birmingham, she called the school “a Zionist outpost” with the “largest [Jewish Society] in the country.” Bouattia has also previously attacked what she called “Zionist-led media outlets,” the report said, and more recently, voted against a NUS motion condemning ISIS because it would be “blatant Islamophobia.”

Excerpt: Unidentified attackers hacked to death a university professor in Bangladesh on Saturday, police said, adding that the assault bore the hallmarks of previous killings by Islamist militants of secular and atheist activists. Police said English professor Rezaul Karim Siddique, 58, was hacked from behind with machetes as he walked to the bus station from his home in the country’s northwestern city of Rajshahi, where he taught at the city’s public university.

Islamist Turkey seizes ALL Christian churches in city and declares them 'state property'

Excerpt: President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has taken control of six churches in the war-torn southeastern city of Diyarbakir in his latest move to squash freedom of speech and religious movement. The state-sanctioned seizure is just the latest in a number of worrying developments to come out of increasingly hardline Turkey, which is in advanced talks with the EU over visa-free travel for its 80 million citizens. Included in the seizures are Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox churches, one of which is over 1,700 years old.